Senate Refuses to Delay Pollution Policy

Published 2:21 pm, Monday, April 25, 2016

President Bush relied on local concerns to trump party loyalty in winning his first environmental battle of the new Congress. Senate Democrats from three states bolted from party leaders and presidential hopefuls to help affirm Bush's air pollution policy.

Democrats from Arkansas and Louisiana, large timber and refining states, respectively, and Zell Miller of Georgia joined with Republicans in worrying about the effect of the cost of new air pollution controls on industry.

By a 50-46 vote Wednesday, the Senate defeated a measure that would have delayed Environmental Protection Agency rules from going into effect. Four Democrats _ Dianne Feinstein of California, Tom Harkin of Iowa, Ernest Hollings of South Carolina and Daniel Inouye of Hawaii _ did not vote.

Echoing the prevailing views of his party, Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the new chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said delaying the rules would have "put jobs and economic stability at nearly 220,000 manufacturing facilities nationwide in jeopardy."

The rules represent a major change in the way older industrial plants including refineries, timber mills and manufacturers deal with air pollution when they expand, make major repairs or modify operations to increase efficiency.

Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., a 2004 presidential hopeful, had proposed the measure. Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., also making a White House run, likewise supported postponing the EPA rules until at least Sept. 15 so they could be studied by the National Academy of Sciences.

Typically, it has been the Bush administration calling for more studies of complex environmental issues and Democrats and environmentalists urging more immediate action.

But among Republicans, senators from Maine and New Hampshire, along with Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island and John McCain of Arizona, bucked the Bush administration. They joined 39 Democrats and one independent.

Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island are part of a lawsuit brought by nine Northeastern states against the EPA. They charge that the administration's changes violate the 1970 Clean Air Act, undermine their efforts to protect public health and will increase the air pollution blown in their direction from the Midwest and Ohio Valley.

The changes give companies greater flexibility to modernize or expand without having to install new pollution controls, though greater emissions might result.

For example, plants that already have installed state-of-the-art pollution controls will not be required to install more effective equipment for 10 years even if they expand or change operations in a way that results in more pollution.

Plants with numerous pollution sources may increase pollution from some sources as long as overall, plant-wide air emissions are not increased. Companies also gain more leeway in calculating their pollution.

Edwards' proposal was an amendment to the $390 billion government-wide spending bill the Senate is debating. He had argued that the proposed rules would result in increased air pollution and health problems. The regulations are supposed to take effect in March.

"This administration has made new rules that are the biggest rollback of clean air protections in history," he said.

Before Edwards' amendment was rejected, the Senate voted 51-45 for another by Inhofe that called for the National Academy of Sciences study but let the rules take effect as scheduled.